When it comes to building bonds of friendships, chimpanzees like humans make friends with chimpanzees of similar personalities.
"Birds of the same feather flock together"! This phrase holds true even for humans who tend to make friends and build relationships with people of "their kind." Previous studies have established that animals too make stable and strong bonds of friendship. In order to analyze the nature of these bonds, researchers from the University of Vienna and the University of Zurich conducted a study on chimpanzees from two zoos.
Sitting within body contact is a clear sign of friendship among chimpanzees. Therefore, researchers examined the personalities of these animals by seeing who they sat near in the zoo
"We found that, especially among unrelated friends, the most sociable and bold individuals preferred the company of other highly sociable and bold individuals, whereas shy and less sociable ones spent time with other similarly aloof and shy chimpanzees", the researcher said in a press release.
Researchers speculated that this preference for similar personality individuals is adaptive because individuals can rely on their partners more in situations that demand cooperation if their partner has similar behavioral tendencies and emotional states.
"It appears that what draws and keeps both chimpanzee and human friends together is similarity in gregariousness and boldness, suggesting that preference for self-like friends dates back to our last common ancestor", concluded the researchers.
The study was published in the scientific journal "Evolution and Human Behavior".
